Sept. 12 (Bloomberg) -- A former News Corp. security staff
member in Britain was charged over claims he conspired with ex-company executive Rebekah Brooks to obstruct a probe into phone
hacking at the now-defunct News of the World tabloid.

Lee Sandell, who worked at News Corp.’s News International
U.K. publishing arm, sought to pervert the course of justice by
working to hide evidence with Brooks, the unit’s former chief
executive officer, and four others, the Crown Prosecution
Service said today in a statement.

“It is in the public interest to charge Mr. Sandell with
conspiracy to pervert the course of justice,” the CPS said in
the statement. Sandell is scheduled to appear in a London
criminal court tomorrow.

News Corp. Chairman Rupert Murdoch, a friend of Brooks,
closed the News of the World in July 2011, after it emerged
journalists accessed messages on a murdered school girl’s mobile
phone in 2002. The investigation spawned parallel probes into
computer hacking and bribery by reporters and led to the arrests
of more than 80 people, including the unit’s former top lawyer
last month.

Other Defendants

Brooks, her husband Charlie Brooks, and her former personal
assistant, Cheryl Carter, were charged in May with seeking to
obstruct the hacking probe in July 2011, by hiding papers and
computers from investigators and removing seven boxes of
material from News International. Mark Hanna, the former head of
security at the unit, and Brooks’s chauffeur, Paul Edwards, were
also charged.

Brooks, who denies the claims, quit as CEO of the unit two
days before she was arrested in July 2011.

Prosecutors didn’t provide the name of Sandell’s lawyer.
Daisy Dunlop, a spokeswoman for News International, declined to
comment.

The CPS received evidence on Sandell from the Metropolitan
Police Service on Aug. 9, according to the statement. The file
stemmed from the Met’s Operation Sacha, which probed the alleged
destruction of evidence related to phone hacking as the scandal
peaked last year.

Brooks and another group of former News Corp. workers,
including ex-News of the World editor Andy Coulson, were charged
in the primary phone-hacking investigation in July. She’s
scheduled to appear in court in London on Sept. 26. Brooks and
Coulson also face potential bribery charges.